Jman.Blog

Dragon Ball Daima is a special, special show

The likes of which we’ve never seen before and in many ways, will never see again. As someone who loves Dragon Ball and has been saying for years that I wish we could take a side quest to explore the demon realm, it feels like it was made for me specifically.

This post will be a little different from my normal ones since I really just wanted to talk about my love for dragon ball in a more positive light, given the general tone of my previous post on dragon ball, and as Daima is approaching its end, there really couldn’t be a better time to gush about this amazing series.

Today we’re here to talk about Dragon Ball and why we love it.

Daima’s Origins

First things first, something that you have to understand going into this is that Akira Toriyama has always taken a fairly passive role when it comes to the anime of Dragon Ball, he’s a mangaka so naturally his priority was always the manga. That being said, something about Dragon Ball Daima spoke to him, as not only is this the most involved he ever was with the production, but originally this was planned to be a short web series of questionable canon status, but after Toriyama’s input it was adapted into a full on anime, of course it’s impossible to say that this was his decision specifically, but the fact remains that he saw something special in this show. So let’s take a look piece by piece.

Heartfelt Opening Theme

Jaka Jaan, the opening theme for Dragon Ball Daima was composed by the edm musician Zedd, but the story behind this composition is, similarly to the production of this whole show, very special.

Zedd is a huge dragon ball fan, so getting the call to compose an opening for a new dragon ball series must have been incredibly exciting to him, but the pressure had to be insane, I mean he’s been a huge fan of dragon ball forever so you’d have to put your best foot forward in this once in a lifetime chance, that being said, what did he do?

 “Out of Time” by Zedd is a song that has a lot of personal meaning to him, he stated in an interview that he started working on back in 2015, ever since, it had been one of his favorite compositions he’s ever made, though he couldn’t quite bring himself to finish it. Eventually he was able to finish the composition, and the song acted as the single for his 2024 album Telos, almost 10 years after he initially began working on it. This composition means the world to Zedd, and it’s evident that he considers it the best song he’s ever created, and so naturally. he used this composition as the basis for the opening theme Jaka Jaan.

This isn’t even to mention that the lyricist for the song is Yukinojo Mori, if you’re not familiar with him you absolutely should be, considering he also wrote Cha La Head Cha La, We Gotta Power, Kuu•Zen•Zetsu•Go, and both openings for Dragon Ball Super among many others. He basically wrote every opening the series has had across the years so to see him back is heartwarming at the least.

Speaking of lyricism, the last point I want to make about the opening is this, of course, during the production of this show Toriyama sadly passed away, so certain parts of the production had to shift accordingly. One of the best changes they could possibly have done is with the lyrics of the opening theme, though there’s no real way to know if they changed it during the production, it seems to be that the lyrics which spell out Akira Toriyama’s name in the bridge was an intentional nod to the creator’s life, before the song “moves on” in a sense to focus on enjoying the incredible piece of entertainment that he spent his life creating. It really gets me emotional every time when the music swells here and it’s one of the things that makes me believe this show ended up as a love letter to Toriyama and everything he contributed to the world.

All-Star Production Team

On the topic of bringing people back to the series, the animation team is basically a dream team of people who have worked on dragon ball in the past. I don’t want to go into super deep detail about the names on the animation team. Basically, what you need to know is, the team that animated Dragon Ball Daima is full of hard hitters from every era, dragon ball, dragon ball z, and super, all of them are here lending a hand to celebrate the series, in addition, most shows don’t have very long for pre-production, usually having about 2-3 episodes fully finished by the time the pilot airs. Famously, Dragon Ball Super had close to no time for pre-production, and was on a weekly schedule rather than seasonal, this led to many of the countless issues the series faced early on as the talented team they’d put together just couldn’t do anything about the unfair schedule. It seems that the higher ups learned from their mistakes, and as such gave the animations nearly 2 years of pre-production, so by the time the show started airing, basically everything that’s been released up to now was fully finished. A schedule like this just flat out doesn’t happen, and both of these are just more instances of how unfathomably unlikely this series is to have been made.

Premise

So, we have an opening theme, we have an animation team, but what exactly is this show about? I mean you can have the most talented people in the world working on something they’re passionate about but if the concept isn’t good, who’s going to watch it?

Well as I said in the opening, this show is about the cast of Dragon Ball less than a year after the defeat of Buu. During the Buu saga Dabura died, Dabura was king of the demon realm, and so this power vacuum allowed for Gomah to take his place as demon king, Majin Buu was created in the demon realm, and his creation ravaged the foundations of the dimension, so upon seeing that Goku and his group were able to defeat Buu, Gomah decided something had to be done about it. Gomah made a wish on the earth dragon balls to turn the main cast back into kids so they wouldn’t be powerful enough to interfere with his plan, kidnapping baby Dende on the way out. Goku and his group are recruited by a mysterious man named Glorio to explore the demon realm and gather the dragon balls to undo the previous wish and get Dende back.

This show has been criticized for turning the cast into kids, especially given how that aligns it with GT which the fandom can’t stand, but frankly I don’t mind this decision at all. It allowed Toriyama to go back to a less serious, more fun loving Goku in a way that doesn’t jeopardize his character like people believe super does. I’ve heard the show described as a fusion of every era of dragon ball, and frankly I agree, there are elements of each in this show and there’s really something for everyone, no matter what part of the series is your favorite.

So let’s take a step back and look at what Daima has going for it, one of the greatest mangaka of all time had the chance to take full creative control of an anime, something he never does, with an opening theme composed by a lifetime fan of the series using the culmination of 10 years of tweaking his work, the lyrics are written by the goat of writing dragon ball openings, the series has almost every well-known or influential animator from the dragon ball’s storied history, who were given an insane amount of time for pre-production, and the premise of the show covers one of the only blind spots in worldbuilding that the series has which people have been curious about for years, and is done so in a way that revisits a part of the series that people generally consider a failure with actual input from Toriyama himself, which is what a lot of people consider to be one of the weaker points of GT.

This is what I mean when I say Dragon Ball Daima is special, it truly feels like all the stars aligned for this show to be made, and for it to be the last Dragon Ball project that Toriyama worked on before his passing, it feels fitting that he was given the chance to make something as celebratory as this.

I hesitate to call this an official review

Mostly because the show isn’t even fully out yet, really it’s closer to me just gushing about how much I love it, but given that fact, let me gush some more.

I really do mean it when I say this show has a little something for every dragon ball fan, no matter what era your favorite is, the first few episodes feel a lot like the pilaf saga, there’s lore regarding the additions that Super made to the universe, and plenty of classic Dragon Ball Z action, with at least one new form so far to top it off. Daima is a once in a lifetime show, it’s not every day that a creator is given the chance to celebrate every era of their work like this, especially one as revered as Akira Toriyama.

Dragon Ball Daima is the last dragon ball project that Toriyama worked on before his passing, of course this led to huge expectations from eyes all around the world. Toriyama was widely loved and respected, and so fans of the series had massive expectations for his last project.

I can’t say how the series ended up being in any objective way, I love dragon ball way too much to be any kind of objective about it, but in my opinion, I absolutely loved what this show has released so far and I can’t wait to see the final act.

Dragon Ball is one of the most beloved series ever made

It has touched the hearts of countless people across the world, and I’m sure that Akira Toriyama knew that before his passing. I love Dragon Ball because it introduced me to a whole new world of entertainment that I never knew existed.

Akira Toriyama is one of the most influential entertainers in modern history, he oversaw the character designs for Dragon Quest, a revolutionary game that popularized the turn based rpg, Mario’s movement animations in Mario 64, a revolutionary game in its own right, were based on Arale from the project he worked on before Dragon Ball, Dr. Slump, Sonic the Hedgehog’s Super form was inspired by Super Saiyan and the series has taken more from dragon ball as time goes on, all this and we haven’t even touched the world anime and manga, the likes of which would look unimaginably different from how they do today without his work. All this is to say, despite only being one man, the landscape of the modern entertainment would look significantly different if it weren’t for Akira Toriyama.

Rest in Peace Akira Toriyama, the world cannot thank you enough for what you’ve given it.